December was especially sweet this year for Kairosoft fans as we got two new games, and one of them is the best I’ve played yet. That game is known as Epic Astro Story and the word “Epic” fits the game nicely. You’ll get to do all the things you know and love from the enigmatic companies previous games, but you’ll get to do them all in Outer Space…
The basic plot of the game is to build up your tiny starting planet into a mega-planet and a tourist hotspot. You’ll accomplish this by discovering new lands, making friends with alien races, battling pirates and of course… leveling, upgrading and lots of building. If you’ve played any of their other sims you’ll quickly get the basics, but there is one major addition to this game that makes it different from the rest. You get to fight in Epic Astro Story!! Well, you get to equip your team and send them out while you watch, but it’s still a battle and it’s a blast to watch.
There seem to be quite a few weapons and skills to equip; so far I’ve seen pistols, clubs, knives, space suits along with several changeable skills. The way you acquire territory is also new and it’s a feature you’re going to use a lot. Whenever you see a darkened territory you can send an away team to investigate. They’ll run through a gauntlet of challenges and when/if they get to the end you’ll have a battle and get the land if you win. Some territories will have special features like explorable caverns, different types of land and even a few aliens in need of assistance.
All the fighting, planet-hopping and building is done through Kairosoft’s tabs setup most of which you’ll be familiar with if you’ve played one of their games. You’ve got your building tab that covers three areas; environment, work and tourism. Environment is where you’ll build your basic things like houses and roads while the work section takes care of farming, mining, processing plants, and a ton of other work related items.
Tourism basically covers anything that gets tourists (aliens) onto your planet and away from their cash. The Planet Tab is a new one and this is one of the places you can get new settlers as well as tourists. The next three tabs – Residents, Tech, and Developer all cover leveling up your residents and discovering new technology. Needless to say, there’s a lot of cool stuff in the game to discover and develop from hamburgers to swords and everything in-between.
Verdict
It took awhile, but in my opinion Game Dev Story has finally given up its throne as Kairosoft’s best. Epic Astro Story has taken all the things I loved from their previous games, added a slew of cool new features, and then set it all in space. The battles are a great addition and if you liked any of their previous efforts there is no doubt you will LOVE this game. I still haven’t gotten to play Mega Mall yet, but for now Epic Astro Story is my personal favorite Kairosoft title and one I highly recommended people check out. There is a lite version available, but you might as well grab the full version for $4.99… you know you’ll end up buying it anyway. If you’re ready to lose a several weeks of your time, head on over to the market and check out Epic Astro Story.